Review of Assumptions and Methods of the Medicare Trustees' Financial Projections. Technical Review Panel on the Medicare Trustees Reports.

摘要

Overall, with few exceptions, the Panel found that the methods and assumptions used by the Trustees are reasonable. The recommendations that follow should be considered proposed refinements and supplements to the existing procedures. The most significant of the recommendations involves the development of the long-range Medicare cost growth assumptions, which have the greatest impact on the evaluation of Medicare's long-range financial status. The current growth assumption used in the 2010 and 2011 Trustees Reports was determined by the Panel in its interim report1 to be not unreasonable. Based upon further discussion and analysis since its interim report was released, the Panel unanimously concluded that use of an updated long-range cost growth assumption together with a new, complementary modeling methodology would be a technical improvement. The Panel also strongly encourages future research to further refine this important assumption.